Trekking into Mayan history

The sun sets on the stones of the pyramid El Tigre, in the distance is the mound of La Danta. The view from the top of the many pyramids dotted around the El Mirador Basin is the same as far as the eye can see -- trees and mounds. Photo by Amiran White/Special to The OregonianThe piece of pottery glistens in the flashlight's beam as I move it around in my hands, feeling the smooth surface. I study the red paint that decorates the ceramic and grin.

In that moment, all else is forgotten -- the humidity beyond imagination, the aching muscles, the spider webs I'd had to wipe from my face during a two-day mule ride through the Guatemalan jungle.

"The last person to touch that was the last person to use it, several thousand years ago," says Richard D. Hansen, head archaeologist of a team in search of Mayan royalty. I stand, speechless, in one of the hundreds of pyramids scattered throughout the Mirador Basin -- the cradle of Mayan civilization.

For years on end, Hansen's team has peeled back the jungle's archaeological treasures, like art restorers scratching away a whitewashed wall inch by inch to reveal a priceless fresco. But these are works most of the world will never see: after being revealed, restored and photographed, they are covered up again

Evidence of conflict

The Mirador Basin in Guatemala's northernmost state of Peten encompasses 600,000 acres and lies within the Maya Biosphere, an area containing more than 500 species of flora and fauna in the area's only surviving rain forest. It is also where Hansen and his team continue to discover Mayan cities that predate the most well-known of Guatemalan Mayan structures, Tikal, by 1,000 years.

Planning your trek

When to go: The best time for treks is December through
February. The Peten region is hot and humid throughout the year, with
April and May tending to be the hottest months. The rainy season runs
roughly from May or June to September or October.

How to get there: Most major carriers offer connecting flights
between Portland and Guatemala City, starting at $613 (Continental) in
a spot search for November. The closest airport to Mirador is the
smaller Mundo Maya International Airport, also known as Flores.
Continental Airlines flies direct from Houston, otherwise TACA flies
between Guatemala City and Flores.

The jungle journey: Carla Molina at Ecotourism & Adventure Specialists
comes highly recommended for arranging transportation from the Flores
Airport to the village of Carmelita on the edge of the jungle -- a
two-hour drive -- and for arranging a guide and pack animals from
there. She can also arrange a helicopter if you choose to bypass the
jungle trek.

These huge cities contain pyramids and stone causeways leading from one city to another. There remains evidence of conflict, including large walls and moats surrounding the cities, as well as millions of pieces of ceramic, obsidian and gems -- all redefining the pre-classic Maya and leading Hansen to believe the region was the first political state in the Americas.

Hansen, chief senior scientist for the Institute for Mesoamerican Research at Idaho State University, has been leading archaeological digs in the area for almost 30 years. He hopes to create a roadless wildlife preserve. By working closely with regional groups and the Guatemalan government, Hansen wants to encourage tourism but keep the area from being overrun by humans.

"Digging a road will ruin the area and encourage loggers, looters and drug trafficking," he says. Instead, he hopes that a narrow-gauge railroad and eco-lodges can be established.

For now, it takes two full days of trekking with pack animals and a guide to reach the archaeological sites in the Mirador Basin. The hot jungle teems with insects, colorful snakes and monkeys screeching overhead. Those with deep pockets -- cost is about $1,250, depending on number of passengers -- can hire a helicopter and reach the camp in 15 minutes from the airport in Flores.

My guide was a young Mayan called Arturo. He spoke little as he led my horse, Macho, and I through the narrow trails of the jungle. Every now and then he would stop the animals and point into the branches as a family of spider monkeys swung through the trees, or as an irritated parrot squawked after being rudely surprised by us.

Fluorescent blue butterflies darted through the rays of sun that speckled the ground through the foliage. A small deer stood on the path ahead watching us, before jumping into the brush.

"Qué bonito," Arturo said, smiling. Yes, I responded, very pretty.

Preserving a wild place

"It was the mules that attracted us," said Peter Sheen, a bearded Englishman now living in Dublin, Ireland, who traveled with his partner, Joan Murray. "We wanted to see the pyramids, and traveling on mules through the jungle seemed like a good adventure."
View full sizeArturo leads laden mules toward the camp at El Mirador, a trip that takes two days. Photo by Amiran White/Special to The OregonianI joined the couple for a semi-cold drink after arriving in the camp. Sheen, a military medal collector, and Murray, who sells antiques, were planning to spend a week trekking through the jungle with their 72-year-old Mayan guide, Juan. After El Mirador they were heading to another archaeological camp farther north called Nakbe.

"We're hoping to see more species of birds, maybe even a big cat," Murray said. As they chatted, a tree frog lost its footing and landed on my bare arm, causing me to jump with a shriek as the clammy amphibian sat there looking up at me with big, round eyes.

At camp, most hikers sleep in hammocks covered by hanging mosquito nets and eat simple meals of beans and rice prepared by their local guide, while listening to the prehistoric growl of the howler monkey and watching for the colorful beaks of a toucan or a rare glimpse of a jaguar.

We walk around the Mayan sites, chatting with the archaeologists and other scientists who spend two to three months in camp, then gasp at the beauty of a sunset followed by the night sky, unpolluted by any light source.

View full sizeThe site known as Structure 34 in the El Tigre
complex sits ready for tourists to visit. It costs more money to keep a
site open and protect it against the elements than to cover it back up.
Photo by Amiran White/Special to The OregonianAlthough almost 300 workers, cooks, archaeologists, scientific artists, environmentalists and other multidisciplinary scientists live in the camp, the tourist remains a rare breed. But Hansen hopes that will change.

Guatemalan President Alvaro Colom supports Hansen's project and has introduced his own plan for increased tourism and environmental protection called Cuatro Balam, which involves preserving a much larger area of the Peten.

But resistance has surfaced from industrial loggers and community logging co-ops, which support an earlier conservation plan based on sustainable forestry. The region has lost 70percent of its forest in the past 10 years.

"To log this area is the equivalent of using the Grand Canyon as the Los Angeles landfill," Hansen said. He is working with various groups and the Guatemalan government to establish permanent protection for the Mirador Basin.

Ancient stones tell tales

"Feel this," he said as he handed me a piece of ceramic. "You need to touch them all the time; you can feel different things -- this is waxy."

View full sizeLaura Velasquez, an archaeology student from Guatemala City, shows Dr. Richard Hansen some of the Pre-Classic ceramics she has found in and around the El Tigre pyramid. Photo by Amiran White/Special to The OregonianI felt the smoothness of the pottery. I watched as Hernandez and fellow worker Julio Cifuentes painstakingly washed every fragment that had been dug from the nearby causeways that join one Mayan city to another and placed them on chicken wire to dry in the hot sun. Hernandez has been documenting his findings around the causeways for the past five years.

"You love it or you hate it, and I love it," he said as he pushed his glasses back up his nose, "and we need the tourist bit here. So people can see why we need help, to see what we're doing and help protect this region. It must be protected."

A rudimentary map lies protected under clear plastic near the camp. Signposts with the name of the excavation sites help tourists find a particular pyramid, and you can wander from site to site. All the workers and archaeologists are eager to talk about their findings and discuss their work.

"The architecture is telling you its story," archaeologist and teacher Beatriz Balcarcel said. "By studying its stones, (you learn) what happened in the past.

"When I was 7 years old I used to collect stones. I had a huge collection, and still I am collecting. Only now I draw the stones and write about them."

Balcarcel has been working on the Great Central Acropolis site, where five walls have shown that much remodeling went on, both by those who made the pyramid and others who came along later and adapted the buildings.

The jungle is alive

Wandering around the jungle, I hear male cicadas clicking their hind legs, the monkeys rustling the leaves, the odd shovel hitting stone, a mumbling of voices.
View full sizeA banded cat-eyed snake hangs out in the jungle. There are over 500 species of flora and fauna to be found in the region. Photo by Amiran White/Special to The OregonianI keep my eyes open for jaguars, parrots and snakes. I keep a bandana at the ready to wipe away the perspiration. I try to imagine what life was like several thousand years ago.

I awaken one day before sunrise, thanks to the howler monkey in the tree above my camp, and walk to a nearby grassy mound. This, like other mounds around, I know to be a pyramid.

Though many of the pyramids have been excavated, they are usually preserved by covering them up after copious photos are taken, papers written and fragments cataloged. Preserving and reconstructing a pyramid once it is exposed to the elements is a very expensive proposition.

But Hansen has been working to keep some digs exposed, to create interest in the region and encourage visitors.

Sitting on the summit, I wait for the sun to rise. The night sky twinkles with more stars than I have ever seen. Then the colors begin to graduate from dark blue to pink to orange. All I can see, as far as the horizon, are treetops.